AmbiophonicDSP VST plugin by Robin Miller and Howard Moscovitz now on available at the electro-music.com store at an introductory price. Click here.

AmbiophonicDSP is a very powerful, yet very affordable, Effect VST™ (Steinberg GmbH) plug-in that dramatically boosts performance listening to stereo audio. Using Winamp, or any VST host in your PC, AmbiophonicDSP renders sound previously unheard, awaiting in your recording collection. AmbiophonicDSP takes stereo to an entirely new level. It must be experienced to be believed.

The AmbiophonicDSP VST plugin is the fruition of many years of research by audio engineering luminary Robin Miller and electro-music.com founder, Howard Moscovitz. The AmbiophonicDSP incorporates several new algorithm developments not found in any other audio device, either hardware or software. This one is the state-of-the-art, the gold standard.

AmbiophonicDSP restores the original recording angle of up to 120° audio stage width (compared to a maximum of 60° in conventional stereo) with lifelike imaging, spatiality, and tone color (timbre). Ambience and reflections achieve listener envelopment (LEV), though from all existing stereo recordings and only two speakers. Individual voices have clarity and space rivaling surround sound. Solo voices and center sounds are adjustable within the mix without affecting widening, are free of the coloration of stereo’s phantom comb-filtering, and are free of the perceptual confusion when center sounds come from speakers not actually in front*.

AmbiophonicsDSP is distributed by electro-music.com and is supported by Howard Moscovitz and Robin Miller on the Ambiophonics forum. Like the renound electro-music.com Klee Sequencer, the AmbiophonicDSP is another fruit of our community, without which this amazing tool might not exist. Proceeds from purchases help support our site.

What people are saying:

Last night, Howard demonstrated the ambiophonic encoder that he has programmed.... He played The Beatles Love CD as source material.... The result was dramatic! As you all know, center information played over speakers in the traditional stereo placement is less than ideal. With speakers close together in the Ambiophonic placement, the center image was magnificent and didn't move about as my head moved. Additionally, the left-right spread was very much wider than the speaker placement would indicate. I was no longer listening to music over speakers. I was listening to music in the room!

--Bill Fox

For the latests version of the User Manual, click here._________________--Howard
my music and other stuffLast edited by mosc on Thu Nov 19, 2009 3:14 pm; edited 5 times in total

Howard, being kind of a newbie to VST plug-ins, I do not yet understand just how I can plug this VST into my system. I listen with iTunes on a PC and a Mac. Will this Ambiophonic plug-in work on both systems? Do I need another piece of software besides iTunes to be the VST host? Will the license allow me to run it on multiple machines?

I really like the presets because I do not at first glance understand how the controls will work. Perhaps I should read more of the Ambiophonic forum to answer these questions but there may be others who need a quick run-down before plunking down some cash for this seemingly amazing piece of software.

First, AmbiophonicDSP is Windows only. We want to put out a Mac version, but we need some help in this department.

iTunes doesn't support VSTs. There are several VST hosts that you can get for Windows including many free ones. The simplest one, IMHO, is Winamp. Winamp can be made to see your entire iTunes music library, BTW.

Once you download Winamp, you have to add to it the VST Bridge add-on which gives Winamp the ability to run VSTs.

Once the VST Bridge is installed, you just configure it to use the AmbiophonicDSP and everything you play through it will be processed.

The AmbiophonicDSP is a personal use license, so you can install it on all of your machines if you want. If one buys the AmbiophonicDSP and for some reason you don't like it, we will do a complete refund within 20 days._________________--Howard
my music and other stuffLast edited by mosc on Sun Oct 06, 2013 2:45 pm; edited 1 time in total

Am I the only one having trouble downloading the manual? I have tried downloading in Google, Google Chrome, and Internet explorer, but my machine just locks-up and I get a blank screen. Is this a bad link?

If you like the free one, you will love the new version. There are two major architecture improvements - but one preset, Pop, is very similar to the free one. Suggest you get it before the price goes up. _________________--Howard
my music and other stuff

Thanks, Howard, I am looking forward to using the "full featured" version -- money has been sent via PayPal.

I tried the Race version in Audiomulch about 6 months ago, but never thought it sounded natural. That might have been my heavy hands on the controls, though. I think that your version with preloaded settings and more intuitive adjustments should be just the thing. Looks to be much more user friendly, too.

Have you or any of the other ambio-philes tried the full blown Ambiophonics scheme using multiple ambiance speakers? If so, I would love to hear of these experiences along wioth any tips you can share. FWIW, I have a couple of JVC XP-A1010 units in mothballs that I intend to use once I can get a satisfactory cross-cancelled ambiopole going.

If you like the free one, you will love the new version. There are two major architecture improvements - but one preset, Pop, is very similar to the free one. Suggest you get it before the price goes up.

Hi mosc,

I've bought the new plug-in version and I'm really enjoying it so far.

As you said, the Pop preset is the most similar to the free one but with more present voices.

Could you please comment the main differences in the new algorithm with respect to the old one?

Now, I am trying to understand which is the influence of the different parameters in the Ambio algorithm in order to properly configure them.
Volume and balance are clear.

Delay, as said in the manual introduces a delay in the crosstalk cancelation to compensate the distance to the ear. The old version had a fixed delay (80us?) but the new version is configurable. Very nice.
However, how the delay value should be calculated to a particular configuration? (in my case, around 118 inches from the listener to the speaker, 78 inches speaker separation, around 40º degree).

Recursion reproduces the RACE algorithm in re-feeding cancellation signals. The old version does not include any recursion, does it?

The old width control (% mix) seems to be fixed at the maximum (the usual configuration I used).

The main question is, what actually the Space and Zentrum parameters control in the ambio algorithm?. Zentrum seems to increase the volume of the common mono signal in order to make center voices more presents (an issue which typically affect ambiophonics). Is space any kind of "stereo expander"?

Glad to see this come alive. Janderclander, I think you are pretty close to explaining it how it works based off of the descriptions in the manual. Zentrum and Space are very interesting names, been watching too many science fiction movies or what?

I wish I had more time to figure out synthmaker as I would like to try and make a version of this with a few experimental parameters, but I was unable to get something whipped up in the trial version before time expired. It seemed I would have had to do some coding even though they try and make everything nice and graphical. Forking out $ for the license is not feasible for me right now.

Thanks for your time and effort to both Robin Miller and Howard. I think I might check this one out while the price is right.

Depending on the soundcard, you can make any vsthost like audiomulch, console or plogue bidule work with any player. The trick is to break the audio stream from the software side before it hits the hardware side of the soundcard. I know and have used a few methods to do this. If anyone needs various methods for making that happen let me know and I'll dig up links to tutorials on hwo to make that happen.

i never managed my foobar player to send the signal directly to audiomulch vsthost and i´m very interested in a method how to make that work.

Thanks

foobar itself should be able to directly handle 2 channel vst's with the vst wrapper plugin.

If you want to use audiomulch what soundcard are you using?

Some cards have the ability to take audio streams and re-route them to ASIO. For example m-audio 1010lt, audiotrak with directwire feature, older audigy cards with kxdrivers and I heard you can do it with one of the asus cards but lose 2 of the 8 channels. Otherwise you can use jackaudio or virtual audio cable to act as a virtual soundcard for the player and route the stream into the VSThost which then uses your real soundcard, but they can be buggy.

1) Simplified steps for installing the VST plug-in in Winamp are in the Reference section at the end of the UserGuide (make sure you have the current version 1.1, confirmed by the date 11/3/2009 at the bottom of p2) - download at http://electro-music.com/forum/download.php?id=19935.

2) For an included angle between speakers of 40deg, the nearest listed in the Table in the UserGuide shows 185us as a starting point. Be aware that angles >25deg will adversely affect results - 16deg is ideal. See the suggestions under Trouble if your socks are still on!

3) FYI, the AudioMulch implementation referred to above is my original RACE, developed for the Ambiophonics Institute, ver F of which is implemented also in (slightly more expensive!) TacT pre-processors. Much improved RACE ver G, implemented in the AmbiophonicDSP plug-in as the Classical/movie preset, succeeds for the first time in maintaining a wide stage while smoothing central images - normalizing their timbral change with respect to side sounds, and correcting their depressed level (using the "Zentrum" control). The other three presets increasingly extract whatever ambience exists in various commercial recordings (little in the case of most over-dry pop music). Since with AmbioDSP we perceive this ambience well into the regions of maximum listener envelopment (LEV - see the Figure in the UserGuide), you may find that additional convolved ambience is needed less.

Thanks for the fine comments above about our AmbioDSP. I demo'd it in New York yesterday and reactions were very enthusiastic._________________Robin Miller

i never managed my foobar player to send the signal directly to audiomulch vsthost and i´m very interested in a method how to make that work.

Thanks

foobar itself should be able to directly handle 2 channel vst's with the vst wrapper plugin.

If you want to use audiomulch what soundcard are you using?

Some cards have the ability to take audio streams and re-route them to ASIO. For example m-audio 1010lt, audiotrak with directwire feature, older audigy cards with kxdrivers and I heard you can do it with one of the asus cards but lose 2 of the 8 channels. Otherwise you can use jackaudio or virtual audio cable to act as a virtual soundcard for the player and route the stream into the VSThost which then uses your real soundcard, but they can be buggy.

Soundcard is an RME Fireface 400 under Windows.
Because of ASIO´s channel occupation foobar sends onto ADAT which is rerouted in the fireface to SPDIF Out, which is physically bridged by cable to SPDIF In and picked up by audiomulch.
Audiomulch splits into 6 channels, each with mosc´s ambio plugin (ambiophonicDSP hopefully in the next days), additional drc-pulse and delay.

Can you guys recommend a test tone file I can open in Winamp to test/calibrate AmbioDSP? Although I am getting pretty consistent (and very good) results on my office PC, the effect on my home system seems to be much more recording dependent. At home I never seem to get the soundstage width my office system can create, and the image seems to be much more sensitive to lateral head movement.

My home system consists of NHT XD 2.2 in a LEDE room and source is a netbook using Winamp to play streaming audio--generally 128K. I know this ain't audiophile territory, but the same rig gives a pretty good conventional stereo performance.

Just the test recording you're looking for is one with Left-Right-Center, voiced & bandpass-filtered pink noise - it's at http://www.filmaker.com/products.htm under Resources in .wma, .mp3, or .wav (for burning a CD).

Eurasian, if your home rig seems too limited in lateral head movement, try increasing the delay from 71us, which is the theoretical starting point. 80~100us is the range for a broader "sweet spot" (and increasingly less focused imaging) when speakers subtend 16deg - see the UserGuide Table if yours are positioned wider. It's also possible that your home setup is on the verge of delivering more critical performance, allowing you to hear imperfection in some recordings? But an LEDE room might need to be more generally dead in order not to wreck the crosstalk cancellation of AmbioDSP, as I found in my control room - try adding absorption.

In experiences I've been collecting - and I'll be interested in your opinion over time, turns out that conventional stereo performance is not a robust standard of comparison. Like re-learning anything to which we've become acclimated, the "conditioned normality" of conventional stereo pales once one becomes attuned to Ambiophonics - the "new normal" (like El-Erian's characterization of financial markets). Even as Ambio enables more critical listening, yielding more realistic results, it is also more sensitive to anomalies, while conventional stereo often sounds only as good as it ever can._________________Robin Miller

I understand what you are saying about too live a room. My previous speakers were Acoustat 1+1's, which are very directional dipoles, and don't require much room treatment at all. I still have them and may give them a try with AmbioDSP if I can't get the NHT's to work well.

i never managed my foobar player to send the signal directly to audiomulch vsthost and i´m very interested in a method how to make that work.

Thanks

foobar itself should be able to directly handle 2 channel vst's with the vst wrapper plugin.

If you want to use audiomulch what soundcard are you using?

Some cards have the ability to take audio streams and re-route them to ASIO. For example m-audio 1010lt, audiotrak with directwire feature, older audigy cards with kxdrivers and I heard you can do it with one of the asus cards but lose 2 of the 8 channels. Otherwise you can use jackaudio or virtual audio cable to act as a virtual soundcard for the player and route the stream into the VSThost which then uses your real soundcard, but they can be buggy.

Soundcard is an RME Fireface 400 under Windows.
Because of ASIO´s channel occupation foobar sends onto ADAT which is rerouted in the fireface to SPDIF Out, which is physically bridged by cable to SPDIF In and picked up by audiomulch.
Audiomulch splits into 6 channels, each with mosc´s ambio plugin (ambiophonicDSP hopefully in the next days), additional drc-pulse and delay.

From what I have heard, that is the one of the only ways to do it with the RME cards although I thought someone on DIYAudio.com had mentioned RME had internal routing?? Can you link spdif out with spdif in without the cable? Seems like conflicting information and I think how you are routing your signal is how you have to do it with that card.

Soundcard is an RME Fireface 400 under Windows.
Because of ASIO´s channel occupation foobar sends onto ADAT which is rerouted in the fireface to SPDIF Out, which is physically bridged by cable to SPDIF In and picked up by audiomulch.
Audiomulch splits into 6 channels, each with mosc´s ambio plugin (ambiophonicDSP hopefully in the next days), additional drc-pulse and delay.

Hi! I'm also using audiomulch as vst host to process multichannel audio applying ambio+DRC. I'm very interested on how have you configured and routed signals in audiomulch. Currently, I'm applying ambio correction for every pair of speaker combinations using several instances of the VST plugin. Could you post your audiomulch layout? Thanks

1) Simplified steps for installing the VST plug-in in Winamp are in the Reference section at the end of the UserGuide (make sure you have the current version 1.1, confirmed by the date 11/3/2009 at the bottom of p2) - download at http://electro-music.com/forum/download.php?id=19935.

2) For an included angle between speakers of 40deg, the nearest listed in the Table in the UserGuide shows 185us as a starting point. Be aware that angles >25deg will adversely affect results - 16deg is ideal. See the suggestions under Trouble if your socks are still on!

3) FYI, the AudioMulch implementation referred to above is my original RACE, developed for the Ambiophonics Institute, ver F of which is implemented also in (slightly more expensive!) TacT pre-processors. Much improved RACE ver G, implemented in the AmbiophonicDSP plug-in as the Classical/movie preset, succeeds for the first time in maintaining a wide stage while smoothing central images - normalizing their timbral change with respect to side sounds, and correcting their depressed level (using the "Zentrum" control). The other three presets increasingly extract whatever ambience exists in various commercial recordings (little in the case of most over-dry pop music). Since with AmbioDSP we perceive this ambience well into the regions of maximum listener envelopment (LEV - see the Figure in the UserGuide), you may find that additional convolved ambience is needed less.

Thanks for the fine comments above about our AmbioDSP. I demo'd it in New York yesterday and reactions were very enthusiastic.

Thanks rmiller for your informative answers. I've been trying and enjoying the pluging in the last days and obtained really noticeable improvements.

At the moment I'm trying to configure an Audiomulch layout using several instances of the ambio pluging for the different speaker channels but I found a problem: delay, balance and profile parameters are not stored from one execution to the other of the vst host. The other parameters work fine, when modified and saved they are maintained when the plugin is reloaded. As delay and balance seem to be GLOBAL parameters for all the profiles they seem to behave differently to other ones and, for the case of audiomulch (and other vst hosts) they seem to be not properly handled. The old free version of the plugin does not suffer from that problem.

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